Sorted by date Results 1086 - 1110 of 7954
For the first time since the pandemic, Wrangell High School students traveled to Shakes Glacier to survey the area and measure the rate that the glacier is receding. Students have been recording the glacier's movements since 2011. This year's cohort included freshman Andrei Bardin-Siekawitch, junior Aubrey Wynne and junior Della Churchill. The trio submitted applications to join the Sept. 7 trip, where they learned about surveying technology, data collection and environmental changes. They also...
A couple of Wrangell-area U.S. Forest Service cabins will have new 16-foot aluminum boats next year, courtesy of a national nonprofit organization. The new boats will go to two of the most popular cabins in the area: Middle Ridge, accessible by former logging roads near the center of Wrangell Island, and Virginia Lake, on the mainland across the Back Channel from town. The SeaArk boats were donated by the National Forest Foundation, a congressionally chartered organization that provides funds for conservation and recreation opportunities in...
The school district is looking at how to cover the bills for sports team travel to state competition last year, this year and in future years, and will hear from the community at a work session Oct. 16. The state travel budget is about $39,000 in the hole from last year’s spending, with no money in the account to cover any travel this school year, Kristy Andrew, district business manager said. The district does not intend to block any student athletes from traveling to state competition this year but does need to find a way to cover the expense...
Every Monday morning, Jenn Tucker harvests 3,600 living plants from one of the shipping containers that serves as a hydroponic farm and fills piles of crates for delivery across Ketchikan. Tucker is the farm manager for Outpost Agriculture, a nonprofit that set up its first hydroponic farm in Ketchikan last year and is eyeing development of similar, controlled environment agriculture operations across Alaska. The Outpost farm building on North Tongass Highway in Ketchikan is an assemblage of eig...
Mike Hoyt, who started work as the school district's activities director on Sept. 22, is no stranger to Wrangell. His mother, Diane Comer, graduated high school here. His father, Mike Hoyt, was born in Wrangell. And his grandmother, Ethel Lund, who died last year, grew up in town and helped found the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium. Though Hoyt grew up elsewhere, "I've been here pretty frequently throughout my life." He moved to Wrangell a couple of months ago. In addition to taking...
As the holiday season approaches and online shopping continues to rise, Wrangell's delivery service faces challenges getting its job done in a timely fashion as it contends with missing address information. Chris and Dixie Booker, who own C&D Deliveries, play detective, using Facebook and other resources to lead them to the right location. "We have a bit of investigative work to do ourselves," Chris Booker said. "Our company is in charge of figuring out those kinds of situations. It gets to be...
The Wrangell Cooperative Association is taking steps to reduce the harm caused by fentanyl, opiates and other illegal drugs by providing free resources to community members experiencing addiction. As of Sept. 26, fentanyl test strips are available at the WCA office, Irene Ingle Public Library and the upstairs bathroom at the Kadin Building, where the state’s part-time Public Health Office is located. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is 100 times more powerful than morphine, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Since it i...
The SEARHC Wrangell Medical Center wants to help the community prepare for the respiratory illness season and will offer flu and COVID-19 vaccination clinics this fall and also provide RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) vaccine shots as soon as they become available. Flu shots, including a supply of high-dose vaccines for people 65 and older, will be provided at the annual community flu clinic Saturday, Nov. 4, reported Randi Yancey, medical office coordinator at the SEARHC facility. The clinic will run from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. “Patients can c...
Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system, which was in place for victories last year by the state’s first Democratic U.S. House member in half a century and the reelection of one of the last remaining moderate Republican U.S. senators, has become a test case for a nation struggling with political polarization. To fans, Alaska’s system shows how voters can reduce extremism and increase civility in government. To detractors, it is an overly complex system that fails to reflect true voter preferences and harms loyal party candidates, especially conser...
The Alaska Permanent Fund Corp.’s investment earnings were again less than withdrawals in the 12 months ending in June, according to preliminary data scheduled to be released at the corporation’s annual meeting this week in Anchorage. The corporation, which manages the $74.9 billion Alaska Permanent Fund, earned a 5.18% return, less than its goal of 7.97%. Since 2018, an annual transfer from the Permanent Fund to the state treasury has been Alaska’s largest source of general-purpose revenue, paying for dividends and public services acros...
The plane that crashed last month in Southwest Alaska, killing Eugene “Buzzy” Peltola Jr., was loaded down with about 520 pounds of moose meat and antlers, according to the first report on the crash released Thursday, Sept. 28, by the National Transportation Safety Board. Peltola, the husband of Alaska U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, was flying a second and final load of meat out of a remote camp when the crash occurred, investigators said in a five-page preliminary report. A hunter told investigators that the second load was 50 to 70 pounds hea...
Alaska has gotten more money per capita from the federal infrastructure law passed in 2021 than any other state, according to participants at a news conference where the latest injection of funds for the state was announced. Alaska’s member of the U.S. House, Rep. Mary Peltola, and officials from the Biden administration used the event at the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage to announce awards totaling $100 million for broadband service in three rural areas. That brings Alaska broadband funding from the Infrastructure Investment a...
First-time candidate John DeRuyter defeated incumbent school board member Esther Aaltséen Reese in Tuesday’s municipal election. DeRuyter was ahead 115-76 after election-day ballots were counted. Borough officials will tally absentee and early votes on Thursday, but there are not enough remaining ballots to change the outcome of the school board race. The school board seat was the only contested race on the ballot. Reese has served on the school board since her election last fall to a one-year term on the five-member board. DeRuyter is a me...
The school district overspent its student travel budget the past two years and is considering filling the gap with money from team fundraising accounts — the cash that athletes, their parents and supporters raise for equipment, uniforms and other extras not funded by the district. Pulling as much as $36,000 from what are known as “class and club” accounts is controversial, particularly since the district has fallen short of explaining the problem and the solution, said several high school team coaches who spoke at the school board meeting on Se...
A record number of people visited Anan Wildlife Observatory this season - the largest amount since 2004, when the permit system was implemented. Of the 2,905 visitors who came through the observatory in 2023, 548 were independent or unguided and 2,357 were commercially guided. Guide companies used nearly 80% of their available permits - only 610 commercial permits were unused. The visitor count was slightly higher than the pre-pandemic peak in 2013 and much higher than the lowest recorded visito...
The 2023 Permanent Fund dividend will be $1,312. Disbursement of the annual payments to Alaskans will begin Oct. 5 and continue over the following weeks, the Department of Revenue said Sept. 21. Applicants who filed electronically and selected direct deposit to their checking or savings account should see the funds in their accounts on Oct. 5. The department will mail paper checks later in October to applicants who did not ask for direct deposit — the same for Alaskans who filed their application by paper instead of online. The dividend this y...
High oil prices could provide an additional $500 for Alaskans a year from now. As part of the end-of-session budget deal put together by legislative leaders, particularly in the Senate, lawmakers in May adopted a provision in the fiscal year 2024 state spending plan that will provide a one-time “energy relief payment” next fall if state revenues exceed estimates. Global supply shortages, caused largely by production cuts in Saudi Arabia and Russia, have driven up oil prices and boosted state revenues for the first three months of the fis...
The Irene Ingle Public Library already offers robust programming to support literacy for children, from weekly story times to the summer reading program. But thanks to a new book club geared toward adults, kids won’t be the only ones reaping the rewards of reading. Starting next month, the book club will give grown-ups a chance to read, discuss, socialize and build a community of fellow literature-lovers. The first meeting is scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 21, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. at the library. So far, 17 people have signed up, which is ...
The process for recycling aluminum cans is about to get easier in the coming months. The Wrangell Cooperative Association’s Tl’átk - Earth Branch was awarded a $40,000 grant through the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium in July to purchase a compactor and baler for its aluminum recycling program. The consortium is working with the federal Environmental Protection Agency to provide solid waste disposal funding to tribes. For the past three years, Tl’átk – Earth Branch has collected aluminum cans outside Wrangell IGA and City Market. W...
A ballot initiative in Sitka aimed at capping cruise visitators at an interim level of 240,000 starting in 2024 — less than half this summer’s count — may be headed for a special election this winter. “Win or lose, it’s going to get some good discussion going,” said Larry Edwards, one of 45 co-sponsors on the application to put the visitor limit to a vote in a special election. Edwards submitted his application for the initiative to the city clerk on Sept. 15 and, pending approval by the clerk, he hopes to begin gathering petition signatures in...
With high oil prices driving up state revenues, Southeast legislators say to expect a larger capital budget next year for public works projects, more money for deferred maintenance and another attempt to boost state funding for public schools. That’s assuming oil prices stay elevated as the state works its way through the fiscal year that will end on June 30 and remain high in the forecast for the next year. Lawmakers will return to work at the Capitol on Jan. 16. With oil prices last week 30% higher than assumed in this year’s spending pla...
Wages rose and job opportunities increased across much of Southeast through 2022, but problems such as the lack of affordable housing and child care remain persistent throughout the region, an economic consultant told the annual gathering of the Southeast Conference. Meilani Schijvens gave Southeast’s economy an overall grade of A, the highest rating she has ever assigned for the region in her annual report, now in its 10th year. “Why did our economy earn an A? … Number One — our jobs were up by 5%,” she answered. “That’s an increase of 2,200 j...
Residents who will not be in town on election day Tuesday, Oct. 3, or simply would prefer to vote early can come to City Hall between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. weekdays through Monday, Oct. 2, to cast an absentee ballot. Election day voting will run from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Oct. 3 at the Nolan Center. People who cannot vote absentee in person by Oct. 2 can contact the borough clerk’s office at 907-874-2381 to request a ballot by mail or fax. Registered voters will cast ballots for two seats on the borough assembly, one seat on the school board and one p...
The state wants to send the Matanuska, the oldest vessel in the Alaska Marine Highway System fleet, into a shipyard for the equivalent of a full-body scan. Management wants to find out just how much of the ship’s steel has rusted, and how far the rust has eaten into the thickness of the metal. The 60-year-old Matanuska has been tied up at the dock in Ketchikan since last November, waiting for the state to decide whether to repair the vessel and restore it to working order, or give up on the ship. “We know we have bad steel,” Craig Torng...
Alaska Airlines would like to improve passenger flow at its Wrangell and Petersburg airport terminals. The idea of making any changes to the buildings was put on hold during the pandemic. “We’ve got to find a way to improve the passenger flow in both those terminals,” Scott Habberstad, the airline’s managing director for Alaska, said last week. The tight space for people waiting to board after they clear TSA security screening creates a logjam on heavy traveler days that can slow down the boarding process. But the terminal buildings are hem...
